


Mor(st)an

by orphan_account



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-05
Updated: 2014-01-05
Packaged: 2018-01-07 13:25:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1120345
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>5 times Mary and Sherlock tried to separate her job from their friendship, and one time they didn't bother.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(or Temperance once pointed a rifle at Sherlock, Mary makes him tea. They're the same person)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mor(st)an

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dust_ice_fire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dust_ice_fire/gifts).



> (unbeta'd)
> 
> For my lovely Maisie (the-archangel-lucifer on tumblr/dust_ice_fire here) who planted the seeds of this in my mind and got me all excited about villain!Mary at 4:30 in the morning

**1.**

The ring slides off her finger and is placed in a secure pocket. Temperance stands front of Sebastian with her chin tilting upwards and a smirk pulling at her face. She didn’t have a ring before, it’s a pretty, sparkling thing and Temperance knows that Sebastian’s trying to work out where it came from.

‘Engaged?’ he almost splutters the words out as they walk through the shadowy halls of the house that once belonged to their father. ‘I didn’t even know you were seeing anyone, sister.’

‘It was none of your business,’ Temperance says. ‘Still isn’t, and I’d rather not talk about it just yet.’

‘You _are_ inviting me though, aren’t you?’

Temperance’s mind jumps to the thin man with bright eyes and a smirk. Sebastian won’t like it, he’ll hate it and seethe, but…

‘Anthony can come, not Sebastian.’

That’s all she’ll say on the matter, they’re _working_ right now and she’d really rather keep that whole thing separate from work, thank you very much.

‘Well, if you want to do it that way,’ Sebastian says as they round the final corner.

The door in front of them might have been beautiful once, but a layer of dust sits on faded paint and the blinds around them are drawn in a state of constant darkness. Temperance doesn’t remember much about this house, Sebastian took her away before she was old enough to understand that her parents didn’t care and her uncle wanted their money.

‘What are we doing here, anyway?’ she asks, drawing a knife out of its sheath. ‘Oh, don’t look at me like that; you know I prefer these when I’m up close.’

‘Sherlock Holmes invited us.’

Temperance stiffens, and perhaps a flash of who-she-is-with-a-ring flashes through her eyes for a moment before she steels herself. Her shoulders tighten and flex after a moment as she prepares to enter, but she puts her knife back.

‘Let’s go say hello, then.’

They push the door open, and Temperance has to blink a few times because Holmes has opened all the curtains, light streams in and all she can see is his silhouette. She knows that he can seem her almost completely, and she gives a calm, patient smile.

He steps forward, his measured steps not giving away the surprise that only flickers across his face for a second when their eyes meet. He didn’t know this, didn’t expect this and a small part of Temperance is _delighted._

‘Hello, Mr Holmes,’ she says. ‘It’s a pleasure to finally meet you. My name is Temperance Moran, and I’m sure you know of my brother, Sebastian.’

 

 

**2.**  

Sherlock never talks about it, the dust filtering through the air of Mary’s former home and she’s glad for that. Sometimes she thinks he looks at her out of the corner of his eye, calculating and trying to work out _what he missed_ , but all she does is spin her ring and ignore it.

‘John!’

She’s in her dressing gown, and her make-up’s not done yet so she’s probably not breaking any rules right now. Anthony looks somewhat pained as she drags him behind her, she’s met Harry but it’s been so hard to try and arrange a time for her brother to come.

‘Don’t look, John,’ Sherlock warns with a smirk, anyway. John’s a complete gentleman and averts his eyes, facing off to the side as if something will go horribly wrong if he catches sight of her. ‘Mrs Hudson won’t be pleased if you do.’

None of them want to tell John that it’s not really because of tradition that Sherlock says this, but because of Anthony. He catches sight of Sherlock and in that moment Anthony disappears and Sebastian Moran is standing there with teeth bared and murder in his eyes.

Mary digs her nails into Sebastian’s arms, warning gleam in her eyes meeting the slip of betrayal in his before it melts away. The sniper disappears, tells and stance adjusting until the ordinary travel writer Anthony Morstan is standing next to her.

Sherlock gives the smallest of nods, a recognition that proved it wasn’t a one off last time before his face flattens into boredom. Anthony and Mary Morstan are far less interesting than the only agents of Moriarty that Sherlock missed.

‘John, this is my brother, Anthony. Anthony, this is John Watson and Sherlock Holmes.’

‘Pleasure to meet you, John,’ Anthony says with a nod, ‘Sherlock. I’ve heard so much about both of you.’

He doesn’t mention it was Jim who he heard it all from.

Sherlock smiles and shakes Anthony’s hand in the fake way Mary’s been learning to recognise. He’s not pleased with what he’s doing but he’ll keep it up for John’s sake, at least for now. The handshake is a bit too long, a bit too tight before they part and step back, both flexing their hands.  

‘John, why don’t you and Mary’s brother get acquainted and I’ll escort her back to Mrs Hudson,’ Sherlock suggests. His smile is mild, but warning as he looks to Anthony and there’s only a moment before Anthony acknowledges it.

Mary hooks her arm in with Sherlock’s as they make their way through where Mrs Hudson is undoubtedly worrying about the flowers, her choices impeccable but perhaps rushed due to Mary not putting the order in quite as early as she should.

‘I won’t tell him,’ Sherlock says, abrupt and deep as it cuts through the silence around them. ‘And I don’t think you will either.’

‘Tell him what?’ she smiles.  

 

 

**3.**

‘Moran, any relation to…?’

‘Cousin,’ Temperance says as she sharpens her knife. She looks up at Holmes, smiling a different smile to her Mary-smile. Sebastian says it’s a lot more vicious. ‘Well, distant.’

‘His boss nearly blew John up.’

She hadn’t known at the time, and although she would put a bullet in that man’s head, she knows she can’t.

‘It was a game, one he knew you were going to win, Mr Holmes,’ she explained, leaning back and glancing at Sebastian. He stiffens, reaching for his gun – Sherlock and games were never his forte after Jim. ‘Now, what did you want to talk to us about?’

‘The assassination attempt on the Australian Prime Minister, only four snipers would have been able to shoot it. Was it you?’

‘Mr Holmes, if that was me, or my brother, it would not have been an attempt.’

 

 

**4.**

‘Oh, _cock_.’

Mary turns around from where she is preparing her tea, John stumbling through the house with a jumper half over his head.

‘What’s the matter?’ she asks, tugging it down and meeting his tired eyes.

‘Call from Greg, turns out Sherlock got himself shot and wouldn’t stay to get it cleaned up properly.’

‘It’s three in the morning? What’s he doing getting shot at?’

Her finger around the trigger, squeezing before a sharp sound rang out.

‘I know, just, go to bed? I’ll see you in the morning,’ John says, grabbing the keys.

‘Nonsense, Sherlock won’t mind if I’m in my pyjamas,’ she said. ‘Mind if I take my tea?’ She lifts the steaming mug and John laughed, pressing a kiss to her cheek.

The drive over is ordinary, a few quick turns but nothing bad enough that Mary spilt her tea everywhere. John’s tired and he doesn’t want to talk much, lips pressed together tight as he worries about Sherlock.

It wasn’t a shot, a graze more like, she wants to reassure him. She can’t tell him though, can’t tell him that the bullet was from her gun.

Sherlock doesn’t look happy as he walks around the room, muttering under his breath and sending the occasional dirty glare at her. Mary ignores it as she starts a fresh cup of tea, willing to take it black if there’s another experiment in the fridge.

‘Would you stop moving?’ John asks, exasperated as he follows Sherlock around with antiseptic and gauze.

‘It’s fine, bullet barely grazed me,’ Sherlock mutters as he looks back down to his laptop again. ‘The question is why though, they were hired by Carter and he _only hires the best_ and yet they missed.’

‘So, maybe they miscalculated?’

A part of Mary, _Temperance_ , is offended at his words, she never miscalculates a shot.  

‘No, too good for that,’ Sherlock mutters, and Mary wonders if he knew who took the shot.

They’ve never explicitly talked about the scenes where Temperance’s been there and when she hasn’t, the thing about a sniper is that you’re high up and away. She tends to be in places so far away that even Sherlock Holmes can’t deduce that she’s the one there, though she supposes that he might have his guesses.

‘Perhaps, they weren’t aiming for you?’ she suggest as she closes the fridge. There's no milk in the tea that she places on the table between them.

Sherlock looks surprised.

 

 

**5.**

‘You were one of the snipers at the pool,’ Holmes says.

Temperance laughs and draws away from the rifle, propping it against the window.  She has the phone in her hand, she’ll be able to get back into position very quickly if they need her to squeeze the trigger and sent a bullet through the mark’s head.

‘Finally get me all alone, and this is the question you ask me, Mr Holmes?’

‘Jim Moriarty hired the best, and you are the best.’

‘Jim didn’t hire us, we offered.’

He pauses, fingers against the wood of the table before continuing.

‘Who else was there?’

‘Just Sebastian,’ she says. Temperance reaches into her pocket and pulls out a pointer, the light bright red against his chest. ‘Whoops.’

Sherlock’s face breaks into a smile, a laugh as she tosses the pointer to him. He studies it for a moment before putting it back down on the table next to him.

‘Are you serious?’

‘Very, we had about… eight each?’ she guesses, it was so long ago now. Sherlock Holmes and John Watson had barely blipped her on radar, she’d only done it as a personal favour to Jim during the one weekend she’d been in London around that time. ‘Sebastian and I are good, Mr Holmes, we don’t need anyone else.’

‘Sebastian’s older than you by about six years? Took you away from home, maybe because your mother was an alcoholic, more likely because your uncle was planning to kill your parents and claim your inheritance. He raised you, joined the army when you were old enough.’

‘Easy to find out on the internet, are you _slipping_?’ she asks, checking the window again.

‘So, you changed your names for day to day living Anthony and Mary from Sebastian and Temperance, where the extra ‘st’ comes from in Morstan. Interesting that you didn’t go for Mortsan, perhaps the use of Mort was too ironical, perhaps it was harder to pronounce.’

‘Both,’ she laughs, delighted. She does love this part of Sherlock Holmes, though rarely gets to see it.

‘You don’t mind me, whilst your brother clearly detests me, and your mention of not being hired by Moriarty. You were friends with him, your brother something more. How long were they together?’

‘Since Seb left the army.’

‘Of course, I suppose he wants to kill me for it. What about our, his, death? Were you there as well?’

‘No, I was in Russia for a bit, came back and the whole thing had happened. Wondered what went on while I was away, so I decided to find out.’

‘Do you love him?

‘Do you need to ask?’

‘Will you stop?’

Temperance stills, her phone buzzing in her hand and she smiles one of her Mary-smiles. It doesn’t quite sit well on Temperance’s face, shows her emotions in a way that was not good for an assassin. It's almost sad. 

She picks the rifle up and turns back to the window. When she glances over her shoulder again, Holmes is gone.

 

 

**+1**

Mary’s finally getting some time to read her new book when the doorbell rings, not a single time but over and over again before she makes it to the door. Sherlock’s standing there, hair limp and blood plastered down the side of his face.

He has been running, breath hitching and wheezing as he braces himself against the frame of the door.

‘Sherlock?’

She’s about to usher him inside, get him a glass of water and sit him down but he waves it off. Mary can see the panicked gleam in his eyes and she falters, fingers curling around the door as he gasps in for breath.

‘They’ve got John.’

She swallows, tipping her chin up. There’s no separation now, the two sides of Mary and Temperance melding together in a moment as she becomes both concerned wife and feared killer.

‘I’ll get my gun.’


End file.
